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Combat
COMBAT: The ratio of fighters in any encounter is 2:1, however, if it is an unbalanced fight, the side with the lower combatant count, can have reinforcements join in to shift the ratio to 1:1. For example: a lone player is jumped by two attackers. A passerby sees this and decides to join the fight to aid the lone player. The fight is now locked with its combatants at a 1:1 ratio. ⦁Once the banners are set and the ratio is locked at 1:1, latecomers cannot join the fight. ⦁If one of the players flees after the ratio locks at 1:1, new combatants may not join the fight to try and balance the ratio again. For example: the lone player who was joined by the passerby decides to flee. They abandon their new ally to face the 2 attackers alone. No one else can step in to assist the passerby who has put themselves in that precarious position. ⦁Players must be within the same district at the start of the conflict to join the fight and participate. You may not call for friends in other zones of the city entirely. ⦁Players that log in to an active combat scenario must move out of chat range to allow the fight to conclude without it being bogged down by random chatter. ⦁No fight can have more than 5 v 5 in a single encounter unless it is a DM guided event. This includes major attacks against other territories and factions. ⦁All large scale combat scenarios, such as taking over a territory, should be organized in advance to permit both sides to mount proper numbers to make the battle worthwhile for all players involved. We require 24 hours’ notice in this regard. Any combat involving more than 10 players should involve a moderator or dungeon master to assist in keeping the combat moving along at a decent pace. Moderators and Dungeon Masters will not be there to prevent any one side from winning, they will simply ensure rules are followed and players are being timely with their part in the fighting. FLOW-OF-COMBAT: A typical combat encounter is a clash between opposing sides, a flurry of weapon swings, feints, parries, footwork and spellcasting. The game organizes the chaos of combat into a cycle of rounds and turns. A round represents about 6 seconds in the game world. During a round, each participant in a battle takes a turn. The order of turns is determined at the beginning of a combat encounter, when everyone rolls initiative. Once everyone has taken a turn, the fight continues to the next round if neither side has been defeated. COMBAT STEP-BY-STEP: ⦁ Determine Surprise. The players determine whether anyone involved in the combat encounter is surprised. ⦁ Establish Positions. The scene determines what positions your characters will be in when combat starts. Work out where you are in chat range, stand still, or go to wherever your character would have been in-world before the battle begins. ⦁ Roll Initiative. Everyone involved in the combat encounter rolls initiative determining the order of the combatants’ turns. ⦁ Take Turns. Each participant in the battle takes a turn in initiative order. ⦁ Begin The Next Round. When everyone involved in the combat has had a turn, the round ends. Repeat step 4 until the fighting stops. SURPRISE: A band of adventurers sneaks up on a bandit camp, springing from the trees to attack them. A gelatinous cube glides down a passage, unnoticed by the adventurers until the cube engulfs one of them. In these situations, one side of the battle gains surprise over the other. Dexterity (Stealth) check for the ones attempting to surprise ⦁ Wisdom (Perception) check for anyone on the opposing side ⦁ Those who do not notice the threat is surprised at the start of the encounter ⦁ This means you cannot move or take action on your first turn of the combat round. ⦁ You cannot take a reaction until the turn ends. ⦁ Surprise is determined by each person, not by group. INITIATIVE: ☀Initiative determines the order of turns during combat. When combat starts, every participant makes a Dexterity (DEX) check to determine their place in the initiative order. Initiative order remains the same from round to round. If a tie occurs, the tied players will have to determine who is going first by having a second Dexterity check. YOUR TURN: ☀On your turn, you can move a distance up to your speed and take one action. You decide whether to move first or take your action first. Your speed; sometimes called your walking speed, is noted on your character sheet. The most common actions you can take are described in the Actions in Combat section. Many class features and other abilities provide additional options for your action. The Movement and Position section gives the rules for your move. You can forgo moving, taking an action, or doing anything at all on your turn. If you can't decide what to do on your turn, consider taking the Dodge or Ready action, as described in "Actions in Combat." BONUS ACTIONS: ☀Various class features, spells, and other abilities let you take an additional action on your turn called a bonus action. The Cunning Action feature, for example, allows a rogue to take a bonus action. You can take a bonus action only when a special ability, spell, or other feature of the game states that you can do something as a bonus action. You otherwise don't have a bonus action to take. You can take only one bonus action on your turn, so you must choose which bonus action to use when you have more than one available. You choose when to take a bonus action during your turn, unless the bonus action's timing is specified, and anything that deprives you of your ability to take actions also prevents you from taking a bonus action. OTHER ACTIVITY ON YOUR TURN: Your turn can include a variety of flourishes that require neither your action nor your move. You can communicate however you are able, through brief utterances and gestures, as you take your turn. You can also interact with one object or feature of the environment for free, during either your move or your action. For example, you could open a door during your move as you stride toward a foe, or you could draw your weapon as part of the same action you use to attack. If you want to interact with a second object, you need to use your action. Some magic items and other special objects always require an action to use, as stated in their descriptions. The DM might require you to use an action for any of these activities when it needs special care or when it presents an unusual obstacle. For instance, the DM could reasonably expect you to use an action to open a stuck door or turn a crank to lower the drawbridge. REACTIONS: ☀Certain special abilities, spells, and situations allow you to take a special action called a reaction. A reaction is an instant response to a trigger of some kind, which can occur on your turn or on someone else's. The opportunity attack, described later in this section, is the most common type of reaction. When you take a reaction, you can't take another one until the start of your next turn. If the reaction interrupts another creature's turn, that creature can continue its turn right after the reaction. = CAPTIVES, RESCUES AND MORE = CAPTIVES: No one may capture another player and ‘forget’ about them. This means you may not capture someone then isolate them and revoke their right to participate in role play exclusively. ⦁ Characters that are put in this position may contact a moderator to determine if they’ve been abandoned or ignored. This is measured by there being an excess of more than one hour of no role play for the captive, within reason. ⦁ Exceptions include captors who arrange to go offline and provide the captive with a public place to be held prisoner so other members of the captor’s faction can engage them in Role Play, or players who mutually agree to continue the capture RP when they can both be online again. Captives cannot magically escape if they are receiving role play from their captor, or the group that is holding them prisoner. Players can only take one person as a captive from each engagement they participate in. ⦁ For example: in a 5 v 5, the tabaxi group is defeated by the human group. Each human can take one tabaxi as a prisoner if they desire. No single human can take all 5 kitties home with them. Captives cannot use Instant Messages (IM’s) or OOC chat, such as Discord or SecondLife group chats, to call for help to rescue them before they are taken away. No one has cellular phones in Waterdeep. If a player feels they have been unfairly captured or that there is an OOC ulterior motive that they are not ok with, they may contact a Moderator to review the situation. RESCUES: ☀Rescues cannot be made until players have role played discovering clues as to when or where a victim was taken. No single person can magically know it has happened without proper role play. ⦁ This step takes a minimum of 24 hours to discover enough evidence to attempt a rescue. No player or group may purposely wait for the captors to log off to rescue with zero conflict or engagement whatsoever. ⦁ Stealthy rescues need to be performed with active players nearby who can then roll a chance to discover what is happening. CLAIMING/TAKING OVER TERRITORY: If your group is claiming empty territory; also considered Neutral territory, you must schedule a DM led event to determine your success. ⦁ If successful, the group must hold and maintain the claimed territory for 1 week before establishing enough NPC presence to mount any sort of assumed defense while players are offline. Taking over territory is deemed to be a large-scale combat engagement scenario and as such must include Moderators should this happen via combat. Player owned territory takeovers (ie: The Zhentarim attempting to take over the Yawning Portal’s Inn) must be scheduled with the faction leadership prior to attempting to do so. This requires 24 hours notice. If a faction loses their territory, they will have to find another area to reside in until they can try to retake what they’ve lost. Attempts to retake an area lost by any faction will need 3 days of prep work to do so. SABOTAGE: =